I think we live in a culture where it is okay to eschew personal accountability. When companies suffer from scandalous news, spin doctors that they’ve hired on staff try to reduce any damage to their reputations. Lawyers settle lawsuits against such companies out-of-court, but they are generally kept from admitting wrongdoing. What’s worse is that by reducing personal accountability, we have often reduced the consequences for doing the wrong thing.
I love this verse from the Bible that is quoted–it’s one of my favorite comedic lines, and yet the stupidity that Adam feigns is so true. He is the typical guy in this situation. He knows he’s in trouble, so he figures if he plays dumb and blames it on Eve, he’ll stay on God’s good side and will avoid the consequences for eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. “Duh… she gave it to me, so I ate it!” Couldn’t let the fruit go to waste, right? Couldn’t risk upsetting her or insulting her by refusing her gift, right? Yeah, I’m pretty sure that neither of those thoughts crossed his mind…
Not long ago my wife asked me to pick up a belated birthday card for her brother. Scanning the rack, I ran across a card with a chimpanzee on the front holding a phone receiver in his hand.
This is what it said: “I better not hear . . . about how upset you are that I missed your birthday. I mean, how do you know I wasn’t in a serious car accident and lying in some ditch out in the middle of nowhere? . . . Well, I may have forgotten your birthday, but I didn’t exactly get any phone calls to see if I was okay. All I know is you better have a good excuse why I didn’t hear from you on your birthday!”
The extent to which people avoid legitimate responsibility is almost laughable, but it is nothing new. When God confronted Adam for eating the forbidden fruit, he chose to blame his wife and God. When we have done something wrong, we can either accept legitimate blame for what we have done or shift the blame to others. The way that pleases God and results in spiritual growth is to accept personal responsibility for our actions. Irrationally blaming others is no laughing matter.
